Grapevine: University bans gender-specific salutations

Mr. and Ms. have been kicked out of City University of New York's grad school. The Wall Street Journal first reported-- school officials sent a memo-- banning professors and other staff-- from addressing students with gender-specific greetings.

"The policy is to eliminate the use of gendered salutations and references in correspondence. Accordingly—Mr. and Ms. should be omitted from salutations."

A school spokesperson says the move was made-- to comply with Title Nine-- prohibiting gender discrimination in schools.

That may be a stretch. An attorney whose job it is to counsel universities on how to comply with Title Nine tells the Wall Street Journal quote --

"They are not mandated to do this…To say they must bar gendered salutations because of the law is ridiculous."

Time Is Money

If you think you're having a bad day, take heart.

A man holding a lottery ticket matching the numbers for a $21 million jackpot just learned he won't be getting a dime-- because he was seven seconds late buying his ticket.

The Supreme Court of Canada made the ruling yesterday.

Joel Ifergan got to the store just before nine o’clock-- the cut-off for buying tickets. The clock on the lottery computer read 8:59 when he bought two tickets-- but the second one came out with a time of nine o'clock and seven seconds printed on it.

That ticket-- matched the winning numbers. But-- the court said rules are rules-- and that ticket was eligible for the following week's drawing-- leaving Joel-- empty-handed.

By The Numbers

And finally-- in preparation for the Super Bowl-- we've compiled some stats you should know.

Eight million-- that's how many pounds of guacamole will be eaten. You'll pair that dip-- with 14,000, 500 tons of chips.

One and a quarter billion-- that's how many chicken wings will be eaten-- averaging out to three wings-- for every single American.

325 million gallons of beer will be consumed-- enough to fill almost 500 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

With all that-- comes the Tums. Antacid sales increase by 20 percent around Super Bowl Sunday. Sometimes-- that's not enough.

Workforce management firm Kronos estimates one and a half million people will skip work-- come Monday.